Tierney Talks hosted the very first TELETHON ForYourart at Frieze Los Angeles in February. We brought our talk show to the art fair and broadcasted live from the ForYourArt booth on the Paramount Pictures Studio backlot, all Frieze long. The result is a collection of 60+ interviews about art, entertainment and community in Los Angeles. We had so much fun! This is the first in a five-part series of Tierney Talks episodes documenting TELETHON ForYourart. Today’s guests include: Alexa DemieHans Ulrich ObristPatrisse CullorsLiz GoldwynSanam SindhiPeter ShireJanicza BravoRachel LordSeth BogartSam BuckJustice Singleton + Blaine O’NeillTierney Talks is pleased to partner with For Your Art to present this series of conversations. ForYourArt is a source of free information about L.A.'s art scene and ForYourArt’s mission is to inspire more people to make art a part of our daily lives. Follow FYA on IG @foryourart and check out http://foryourart.com/. I especially love their curation of online exhibitions.Follow Tierney on IG and Twitter @TSTAR7 and subscribe if you haven’t already. Our show music is “Let Me Love You” by Dis Fantasy (streaming everywhere!) Today’s show was recorded and edited by Margot Padilla and hosted, written and produced by Tierney Finster. Special thanks to Jess Calleiro, Niko Karamyan, Bryan Johnson, Ali Madigan, Bettina Korek, Kevin McGarry, Cobi Krieger, Peter Shire, Kayne Griffin Corcoran, Pretend Plants and Flowers and Universal Standard. 

Tierney Talks

Patrisse Cullors, Alexa Demie, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Liz Goldwyn, Sanam Sindhi, Peter Shire, Janicza Bravo, Rachel Lord, Seth Bogart, Sam Buck, Justice Singleton + Blaine O’Neill

Niko the Ikon is an artist and actor in L.A. Join us for a moody quarantine phone call. We invite you to eavesdrop. We discuss creating harmony between you and your living space and bringing intentionality to your interiors. We also alk about bringing love into day-to-day-life and how this time at home feels like a return to our pre-teen lives and friendship. “I’ve been living in a way that I thought was long gone,” Niko tells me. Niko motivates me to clean. We trip out on our relationship to time and space and reflect on sitting at home, spending time alone and how not being a fake bitch is a superpower. We meditate on the wealth of what we’ve shared together as long-time friends and get into cybersex, physical touch and healing our heart chakras. We talk about trusting ourselves, trusting our friends and how the shifting culture around mental health has impacted our relationship. Increasing our permission to be emotionally honest as we go. We encourage every actor to hold tight to their dream and laugh about auditioning within the limited casting lanes of mainstream media. Niko asks: “Why is it so often that we’re not allowed to be ourselves?”We recorded this on the 105th commemoration of the Armenian Genocide (April 24) and reflect on the strength of the Armenian diaspora. “Oppression always backfires,” Niko tells me. “The more we deny these things, the easier we make it for the atrocious to be repeated; what a century of denial says is, ‘You can get away with this.’” This episode is best enjoyed alongside cannabis (tea, aromatherapy, sunshine, and long-form bathing rituals are great too!) Follow Niko on IG @nikotheikon + Tierney @TSTAR7 and subscribe to the show to get the next episode early. Music is “Let Me Love You” by Dis Fantasy (streaming everywhere). This episode was recorded and edited by Margot Padilla. 

On The Phone with Niko The Ikon

Andrea Amez is a holistic esthetician, transformational glow-up practitioner and product concierge. Tierney talks to Andrea about taking care of herself while quarantining at home, opening her own skin studio in LA and infusing some expert know-how into your daily skin and beauty rituals. Andrea talks about avoiding obsessive self-grooming, reading your body by paying attention to inflammation and keeping centered as a self-employed person and small business owner amid economic uncertainty. Together they discuss beauty acquisitions and brands that plummet in quality after being acquired, the legend of Olaplex, and the mass beauty culture shift currently happening as people can’t maintain their fillers, extensions and other aesthetic treatments. They also talk about trying cannabis sheet masks and skincare and using CBD tinctures meant for consumption as a topical face treatment. Tierney reveals the beauty products she’s bought online while staying at home, including a certain cult-favorite hair supplement whose infomercial she loves, reflects on beauty rituals as “prayer” instead of “proof,” and shares a short beauty-inspired reading list. Andrea explains avoiding talc in makeup and body products, paying attention to product expiration dates and vetting the use of supplements to increase immunity. She also dishes about meeting her fiance at the Aesop store, bonding over Carol's Daughter hair products and proposing to him in Japan.Andrea answers listener questions like: How can I reduce my redness and inflammation? What are the best foods for detoxifying your skin? What drug-store products will make for the best impromptu at-home facial? What is the best way to treat a breakout without picking it? What kind of masks and treatments can I whip up at home? How and why should I make my health and beauty routines more “experiential?” Does using a silk pillowcase really make a difference on hair and skin? What can hospital workers use to prevent skin friction from constant mask-wearing? How do I use a gua-sha tool? There’s also a celebration of Earth Day and the New Moon :) Follow Andrea @amez_pro and check out http://www.amezskin.com/ and follow Tierney @tstar7.  Tierney Talks proposes you consider matching any money you spend on beauty non-essentials with donations to individuals and organizations. Tierney and Andrea donated to The Okra Project, a collective that brings healthy meals to black trans and gender non-conforming people. You can do the same by PayPal-ing the Black Trans Solidarity Fund – https://www.paypal.me/btsf – and encourage friends to do the same (or go in together!) Special thanks to our audio producer Margot Padilla. She produced our opening track too! Stream “Let Me Love You” by Dis Fantasy everywhere <3

Andrea Amez – Quarantine Glam with a Holistic Esthetician

Molly is a writer and iconic Valley Girl. You can read her in tons of magazines like Elle, InStyle, the New York Times Magazine and The New Yorker. She also wrote the introduction to the newest collection of Eve Babitz essays, “I Used To Be Charming: The Rest Of Eve Babitz.” We talk about Comrade Britney, Mimi Zhu, Lana Del Rey, Rihanna, Grace Jones, Madonna, Eve Babitz, Joan Didion, Susan Sontag and “The Murder of Laci Peterson.” We also talk about interviewing celebrities for magazines, clearing our heads at LA malls and pining for clothes at the old Betsey Johnson store in Sherman Oaks. Molly tells us about organizing Angelenos around housing inequality and describes how hosting the Olympics causes cities to fast track gentrification, escalate policing and further criminalize homelessness. She also shares the history of her grandmother’s own experiences as a Jewish-German Olympic athlete in pre-WWII Germany. Follow @NOlympics LA for more on that and @mollylambert on IG and Twitter <3 Also, listen to Molly's podcast Nightcall with cohosts Tess Lynch and Emily Yoshida every Monday. Call their hotline at (240) 466 4448 to leave them a message about PLASTIC SURGERY all April. And check out Molly's special Summer House quarantine podcast via her Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/mollyssleazyfriends/postsThanks to our audio producer and sound designer Margot Padilla <3 First ep recorded on Skype as we socially distance! 

Molly Lambert – LA, TV, Writing + Pop Music

Tierney Talks celebrated one year of podcasting with a live show at Murmurs, a favorite art gallery, cafe, shop and community space in LA. The variety-show-esque program consists of readings, musical performances, conversations and a DJ set. Here’s the timing of everything, just in case you want to listen out of order: 2:15 - A karaoke-centric reading & performance by writer, sartorialist and Sisters With Invoices founder Amelian Kashiro Hamilton. 18:04 - PLUR poetry and pop music by artist, organizer and co-founder of Cosmo Visiones Ancestrales La Pachamami. 33:09 - A one-on-one conversation with State Assembly Candidate Fatima Iqbal-Zubair about how representatives outside of your own district can transform state-wide legislation, repelling corporate funding, running an independent campaign and housing and education inequality in LA. 57:06 - A one-on-one conversation with artist, activist, model and writer Emily Barker about the history of standardized and invisible norms in architecture, ableist design as structural violence and what inspired their most recent exhibition “Built To Scale.” 1:31:00 - Amelian's DJ set begins! Featuring incredible adlibs by NikoTheIkon. Recorded live and sound mixed by audio engineer extraordinaire Margot Padilla. Follow me on IG @TSTAR7 and tell me who to talk to next. Thank you Morgan Elder and Allison Littrell for welcoming us at Murmurs. Thank you Camila Creates for your wonderful catering and Andrea Ámez for your Ámezing facials. 

Tierney Talks Live At Murmurs - Performances by Amelian Kashiro Hamilton & La Pachamami + Conversations with Fatima Iqbal-Zubair & Emily Barker

Beth Pickens helps artists. She invented her own job, combining counseling and arts management, and now works as a consultant for artists and arts organizations in L.A. She is also the author of "Your Art Will Save Your Life" and the host of Getting Real About Money workshops. Beth is a Capricorn, like me, and we meet on the first day of Capricorn season for a powerful conversation about working from home, working with other people and working on our relationship to money. LISTEN TO HEAR HOW YOU CAN MAKE MORE MONEY IN 2020. Beth describes how family is the foundation of group psychology and the way workplaces often mirror the family dynamics of each employee. We also discuss coming from families who didn’t self-describe as artistic or feminist and who weren’t highly educated or rich. We talk about Beth’s childhood in the deep Rust Belt, the way attending the opening of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh impacted her adolescence and growing up adoring Andy Warhol before the mass commercialization of his imagery. I realize I grew up in the aftermath of a “boom and bust” generation and about different kinds of money damage (and getting over the idea that nothing about money can be positive). Beth says rich people have crazy money damage too! We talk about growing up in financially homogeneous neighborhoods (like Beth’s, where the richest family around was comprised of two teachers) and financially dissimilar hometowns (like mine in LA, where heiresses and low-income people could all end up in the backseat together). Beth shares one of her own most transformational financial habits and reflects on gauging whether your romantic partner is making you a better artist or not. We also touch on blue ocean strategy and The Babysitter’s Club! Follow Beth - http://www.bethpickens.com/, read her book and consider attending one of her Getting Real with Money workshops later this year! 

Tierney Talks to Beth Pickens - More Money 2020

New episode of Tierney Talks with @paulakahn2020. Paula Graciela Kahn is a congressional candidate currently running to represent California’s 30th District – the San Fernando Valley. Celebrate this “holiday” by listening to a femme against fascism. We talk about the just transition - as in a shift “from an exploitative, extractive, global war economy to a cooperative, regenerative network for local peace economies.” Paula tells me about how volunteering in Tijuana & observing atrocities at the border & in detention centers inspired her to run for office. She calls to shut down the Adelanto Detention Center in San Bernardino & describes her experiences advocating for detained friends in ICE centers. Paula wonders why ICE budgets are increasing when people are dying in ICE facilities, explains the immigration detention & deportation industry & shares how 9/11 & the Iraq War activated ICE. We explore her non-profit Cosmovisiones Ancestrales & the notion of using drugs to support people who are victims of state violence through demobilization, disarmament & reintegration. We discuss the first scholarly article about “cult mushroom” ceremonies, how it fueled psychedelic tourism & the present need to create ecological preserves to protect plant medicine. Paula also imagines the recodification of psychedelics & other indigenous plant medicine by white venture capitalists & Western companies patenting indigenous medicine (a la the legal marijuana industry). We also discuss the deficit of Latinx femmes in Congress & healing as nonlinear. We talk about the housing crisis in the San Fernando Valley & inclusionary zoning. The incumbent candidate, Congressman Brad Sherman, hasn’t done enough in regards to these issues. He’s been in office since 2013 :( She’s sick of trusting strangers to protect her community – please support Paula at the ballot in March! Raise your expectations for who your local rep could be! Send this to someone who votes in the Valley & donate to her campaign via the link in the bio. $5 helps!! More if you’re rich!!! Paula is the most PLUR congressional candidate of all time, promise. Follow her too <3 This episode contains original music by our sound engineer and audio producer Margot Padilla. https://www.paulakahn2020.com/http://cosmovisiones.org/https://secure.actblue.com/donate/kahn2020

Tierney Talks To Paula Kahn - Running For Office

New episode of the podcast featuring @theaprilflores out now! April is a porn performer, model and artist from Los Angeles. She’s the star of Fat Girl, a fine art book that documents 12 years of her erotic art practice with the photographer Carlos Batts. In 2005, she got her start performing in porn with Belladonna and in 2014, she became the first performer to win the AVN Award for BBW Performer of the Year. She’s won a Feminist Porn Award for her work in “Lesbian Curves 3: Soft Girls and Strap Ons” and wrote about beauty and embodiment in Tristan Taormino’s The Feminist Porn Book: The Politics of Producing Pleasure. We talk about learning the term “zaftig” and she clears up my misunderstanding of what a FUPA actually is. She’s the first Tierney Talks guest to have her own masturbator toy and tells us all about the molding process (she’s the first BBW to be molded for such a toy & the Amazon reviews are worth reading!) We talk about entering the porn industry as a hobbyist, weed and body dysmorphia and the plus-size amount of work left to do in the fat acceptance movement! We also talk about fat representation in porn vs mainstream fashion and entertainment, enjoying her exhibitionism and her female fan base. April describes the way making porn fulfills her interests in filmmaking and says her main career motivation is to be visibly naked, fat, fucking, having fun and getting paid for it. And we’re smoking weed and wearing lingerie the whole time! Available on Apple, Spotify, Google Play, Stitcher, etc Credit and thanks to our engineer and audio producer Margot Padilla, whose band Dis Fantasy made the music you hear at the beginning and end of this episode ("Let Me Love You" and "She Magical." Check out Dis Fantasy's LP, streaming now! 

Tierney Talks To April Flores - Fat Girls

Andrea Amez is one of my favorite people to speak to in general, but especially about everything to do with skincare, beauty and wellness. Oddly enough, we didn't discuss any products her first time on the podcast, but today she's back with her favorite hair conditioner, lip balm, body wash, deodorant, body exfoliants, facial peels and more in tow.Find the full list of products discussed here: http://bit.ly/TierneyAmezSummerProductsAmez explains what my “acid mantle” is, how it differs from my skin's “microbiome” and how probiotic skincare impacts them both. She illuminates the thinking behind "vibrational" and "energy-based" products intended for emotional and spiritual results. She shouts out some of her favorite product lines (@aliangeskincare, @agentnateur, @oseamalibu + dozens more), calls herself a “body wash slut" and answers all my questions. Such as: - Should I buy the big bottle of rosewater with glycerin or without? - What's the difference between $6 hyaluronic acid serum and $300 hyaluronic acid serum? - Are these vegan gummies really going to hydrate my skin? - How should I use my new Rose Quartz roller from @chakrubs? - Why are my freckles more visible directly after sun exposure? - Is it bad to love products? Fresh off a trip to Mendocino, I discuss the cannabis tourism industry and wonder about what the next big cannabinoid will be (THC and CBD are 2 / 113). I also talk about William Randolph Hearst printing racist lies about weed in his newspapers because he owned huge timber holdings and paper mills and felt threatened by hemp paper. I hit my @leunebrand vapes and sip @kikoko_hq weed tea until I begin to wonder if I'm saying half the names of these beauty brands right. I describe being in the operating room during a stranger’s Brazilian Butt Lift and the psychological reasons people love picking at their partner's skin too, both based on @wearemel stories. Find the full list of products discussed here: http://bit.ly/TierneyAmezSummerProductsCredit and thanks to Margot Padilla, the best sound engineer. 

Tierney Talks to Andrea Amez - Summer Products

Tierney invites screenwriter Michelle Badillo and comedian Heather Jewett into the Montez Press Radio RV outside the 2019 Los Angeles Book Fair. While book collectors stroll MOCA and the radio staff cracks beers on lawn chairs outside, Michelle, Heather and Tierney crouch around the motor home's dining room table and discuss their mothers. The segment is called "Maternal Adoration and Agitation" because that bond is crazy AF. Heather reads a piece called "Meal Time With Mommy," Michelle reads a diary entry from high school and I read an excerpt from my short story "Reseda," which originally appears in Dazed and Confused A/W 2019. Heather and Michelle's stories are sooooooo funny and beautiful, you'll squeal and squirm and smile. Follow Michelle @_mistermichelle and Heather @hurrrjurrrThank you Montez Press. 

Tierney Reads with Michelle Badillo & Heather Jewett - Mommy Issues

Michelle Badillo is a screenwriter and actor from Queens, New York. We are globally renown best friends. Michelle is a sexy television writer and humorist, best known for her work on One Day At A Time, the Netflix reboot of the original Norman Lear sitcom, and The Bold Type, a show about young journalists for which she probably drew great inspiration from my life. You also might recognize Michelle from the steamy, non-binary facesitting scene in season one, episode three of the Starz show Vida. She's appeared in Vogue because modeling is very easy for her. Michelle is so funny, so smart, so silly, so naughty, so sweet, etc. We talk about The Hills: New Beginnings, especially how emotional Michelle became when Mischa Barton appeared on screen and how much we love Brandon Thomas Lee. We tell the story of how we met and our first impressions of one another – including lip rings, crowns, bodycon dresses, cigarettes, screenwriting, Facebook and early bedtimes. We also reflect on trusting our intuition, coming out after a GSA meeting and noticing childhood class dynamics. We mock the trust fund kids we went to school with, including their helicopters home to La Jolla, self-driving sports cars and wack-job parents. Michelle has the nerve to disclose where we attended school and I covertly assert that I was too smart to go there. I finally admit that I was famous but bullied on campus. We talk about the unique way moms talk about their daughters' bodies and Michelle teaches me how to become a successful screenwriter. I qualify multiple comments with "not to stigmatize" because I don't want to stigmatize. Michelle sings a couple of showtunes, lusts after Megan Fox and reflects on the more challenging aspects of lending her own teenage experiences as a queer woman of color to a character on TV. Finally, we play "Tierney Answers," an incredible new segment where my guest interviews me about my many attributes and preferences. Follow Michelle on Instagram and Twitter - @mistermichelle_ Follow me too  - @tstar7Like and subscribe Like and subscribe Like and subscribe Like and subscribeCredit and thanks to Margot Padilla, the best sound engineer

Tierney Talks to Michelle Badillo - Sexy Besties

Peggy Noland is an American fashion designer and artist known for her eccentric clothes and cheeky critiques of consumer culture. In this episode, Peggy discusses being a lifelong “texture queen,” the biological underpinnings of our slime obsession and the thrill of crushing Tide Pods between her fingers. We get into her experiences teaching high school students, closing her iconic store in Kansas City and changing the vehicular aesthetic of Los Angeles one hand-painted car at a time. We also talk about why she is so impacted by JOANN Fabric and how an early exposure to fast fashion factories in India changed her career trajectory.  Peggy counsels my imposter syndrome, describes the emotional experience of making projects alone and addresses learning from creative misses. Peggy is a silly, supportive friend. Follow her on Instagram @peggynoland. “Peggy’s Cartoon-Up” is an original song by Shannon Shaw and Seth Bogart. Watch Peggy’s car-painting webseries here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqGa6p1BINg&t=1s“That’s So” is an original song by @disfantasy (a new bubbly hip hop group featuring our audio producer Margot Padilla). Follow me @TSTAR7 and share this podcast with someone who likes slime, clothes or the sound of my voice. Credit and thanks to Margot Padilla, the best sound engineer. 

Tierney Talks to Peggy Noland - Craving Texture

Jiz Lee is an award winning porn performer, queer porn superstar and author of the anthology “Coming Out Like A Porn Star: Essays on Pornography, Protection, and Privacy.” This episode begins with two readings from the book, followed by a conversation with Jiz about the origins of their porn career, the importance of teaching porn literacy rather than arguing about “good porn” versus “bad porn,” not shaming someone’s sexual fantasies and dispelling myths about porn production.  Then, we move into a panel discussion with Lotus Lain and Miss Mimosa. Lotus Lain is an independent porn performer, writer and activist who works with the Free Speech Coalition, the adult industry's trade association. Mimosa is an artist and sex worker with experience as a professional dominatrix, BBW porn performer and fetish content creator who spends most of her time in San Francisco in LA. She also works behind the camera in both adult and mainstream film, doing both casting and performer advocacy. The group discusses diversifying who gets to feel sexy, their experiences disclosing their work to both friends and family and new acquaintances and the hypocrisy of the way Hollywood treats sex workers. Lotus speaks about being outed as a porn performer without her consent, the stigma of having sex for fun and how porn can be one of the safest settings to explore kink. Mimosa remembers asking her mother about how she would react if she became a porn star at the age of ten and reflects on body positivity within porn. “Having a body that’s different, for me, was always a source of power,” Mimosa says. “When you’re your own home, other people will want to be there.”This episode was recorded live during Pillow Talk in the penthouse at the Standard Hotel in Los Angeles. Follow @jizlee and buy their book here: bigcartel.com/product/coming-out-like-a-porn-starCredit and thanks to Margot Padilla, the best sound engineer. 

Tierney Talks to Jiz Lee, Lotus Lain and Mimosa - Coming Out

Andrea Amez is a gifted esthetician, discerning product concierge and educated cosmetic chemist. She is best known for the "transformational facials" she gives at Skin Worship, one of the most influential, holistic beauty collectives in Los Angeles, and for her own fabulously luminescent skin. Our friendship alone changed my skin way before she gave me my first facial. Andrea convinced me to stop relishing in the sick pleasure of extracting my own blackheads, educated me about the benefits and tricky politics of the "green beauty" industry and actually got me to use toner and sunscreen daily (after years of knowing I should). Andrea is also a cranial sacral therapist, meaning she performs subtle bodywork on the bones of the head and spinal column to release energetic blockages from the body. She may see celebrity clients in Beverly Hills and have her signature style of natural glam featured in L’uomo Vogue, but her philosophy as a healer is inclusive and compassionate. Listen to our conversation to hear how a run-in with a Hollywood superstar in the early 2000s fueled her passion for skincare, how she's attempting to correct gaps in the availability of quality skin services for women of color and how spirituality factors into her practice as an esthetician. Andrea also answers questions about types of retinol, under-eye discoloration, under-boob acne, the various dermatological issues plaguing our inner thighs and genitals, whether or not smoking weed is bad for your skin and how so many influencers go about achieving skin as smooth as a dolphin's.  Andrea is brilliant, hilarious and delightfully down-to-earth. Follow her on Instagram @amez_skinworship. While you're at it, follow me @TSTAR7 and share this podcast with someone you would discuss your ingrown hairs with <3And if you'd like Andrea to answer your skin, beauty, etc questions next time we talk, send them ALL my way: finster.tierney@gmail.com. Credit and thanks to Margot Padilla, the best sound engineer. 

Tierney Talks to Andrea Amez - Unpretentious Glam

Join writer, actor, artist Tierney Finster and her guests for intimate conversations about their lives.

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